Cambridgeshire Mayoral Elections May 2017

[LocalEditorCambridge]

On May 8th people across Cambridgeshire will get the chance to vote for the first Mayor for the new Combined Authority for Cambridgeshire & Peterborough.

The decisions this mayor takes will inevitably impact the lives of families across the region - and so we thought it would be helpful to start a thread here to raise awareness of the candidates, their policies and their remit.

Also, if you are interested in asking them anything directly let us know - we could contact the candidates and see if they are interested in joining us for a Mumsnet webchat.

The candidates are:

James Palmer - Conservatives
Julie Howell - Green Party
Rod Cantrill - Lib Dems
Kevin Price - Labour
Paul Bullen - UKIP
Peter Dawe OBE - Indpendent

Thank you for starting this thread. Most important thing is that people need to registered to vote! Registration closes on Thursday 13th April: www.cambridge.gov.uk/elections-and-voting

Thank you! I'll post that on FB too - very good point.

I missed English Democrats candidate Stephen Goldspink from my OP

He's on the list & linked in this article

list of Mayoral Candidates

Can anyone explain what the Mayor's powers and remit will be? Thanks!

LetMeGo the official answers can be found here: www.cambridgeshire.gov.uk/devolution . The honest truth is its a god-awful mess. We will now have the Cambridge City Council, South Cambs District Council, the County Council, the City Deal and the Combined Authority led by the Mayor all eager to assert themselves and get a slice of the action.

bumping this to see if there's any interest in posting questions for the candidates in this Mayoral election.

One question from me - live in a CB1 postcode area.

Why has not one single candidate either canvassed in person or by flyer to our address? Other than the list here and a couple of facebook posts today there has been no information about who they are unless you search for it!

i am unsure whether to vote for the green party, lib dems or labour. what is the biggest difference between them?

I'm in CB1 and have have reams of literature, from memory it was from Tories, Labour, Lib Dems and maybe one other.

I'm in cb1 and have had nothing.

There are approx 200k total voters in the area covered for the mayor, compared to about 60k for GE constituencies and about 6k for city council wards. I've heard an analogy used that your individual vote in a city council election is like being a supporter in the stands at an average Cambridge United match, while in the mayoral election it's like being a supporter in one of three full Wembley stadiums, if that makes any sense? The area is basically far too big for them to cover.

Various candidates have been running stalls in the centre of town if that's any use to you. Several organisations have also run hustings events. I'm surprised that you haven't had flyers, the one's we've received have been co-delivered with county council election material.

The numbers suggest that it's a foregone conclusion that the Conservative candidate will be elected, regardless of how voters in the city vote, because of the high proportion of the electorate in the rest of the county which is historically a Tory-leaning area - Heidi Allen is South Cambs MP, Lucy Frazer is South East Cambs MP, Stewart Jackson is the Peterborough MP, etc. All Conservative. Strongly suspect that James Palmer will do very badly in Cambridge but walk it overall. So much for devolving power to the local level.

Just remembered - if you want to see flyers, there is a central website where they might have been uploaded & collated (though it doesn't seem to be working right now). electionleaflets.org/

Honestly, the mayoral election is a red herring IMHO. Concentrate on getting in the County Councillor that you want on 4th May.

Badly written article but it gives the current bookies' odds: www.cambridge-news.co.uk/news/cambridge-news/ladbrokes-cambridge-and-peterborough-mayor-12928389

Honestly, the mayoral election is a red herring IMHO.
Except that they will have a budget of 20 million and cover housing, transport and skills in the region.

Check out on iplayer BBCs A Mayor for Cambridgeshire to see them all in a question time style debate.

Apologies for the screenshot, haven't got time to dig out the original link now, but this is a small example of why a £20m budget is chicken feed, given the population and size of the area covered. Road schemes are even more expensive - City Deal is allocating £39m just to the A1307 between Cambridge and Haverhill.

OK - can someone tell me who to vote for, to give us the best chance to not get a Conservative Mayor? I would normally vote Labour but should I switch to Lib Dem for tactical reasons? Both lib dem and labour blurb say they are the second runner...

And yes please to the webchat. I would particularly like to know exactly what the candidates would do about transport - they all say they will improve it but they seem shy of suggesting actual solutions. probably because there are no easy solutions.

Postal vote received, internet research conducted, filled in and am done, hooray

yes silicon jen, i would also like to know who to vote for so as not to get a conservative mayor. libdem or labour?

silicon and rosemarie - normally a Labour voter too but I've done a lot of reading over the weekend and I'm voting LibDem for all of the upcoming elections.
Don't know if this is a good tactic or not but basing it on what I've read!
Anything but the Tories for me.

Another one planning to vote for Lib Dems here.

And in my neck of the woods (up Huntington road then hang a right at Girton college) I'm starting to see a pleasing flurry of LD posters....which stick out because I've yet to see a single Con or Lab one!

Really hoping for a no-Tory outcome.

Frankly depressed at all the candidates being white middle aged males. Don't think any of them have the nous or experience to do a good job. Our MP is Heidi Allen, and she's very good, I've been in touch with her over a number of issues and she's been engaged, helpful and prompt in her replies. As for the councillors, our Parish Council pointed out that the Lib Dem candidate's leaflet round here (South Cambs) was a work of fiction. The candidate had gone on about how they had got Speedwatch schemes up and running, and were heavily involved in their success, when their entire contribution to the scheme was writing one letter after the scheme had gone into operation. Have been very impressed with Susan van der Venn's work on the A10 cycle way, but sadly we don't live in her ward.

Disappointed with the lack of campaigning - we've had two leaflets through the door and that's it. In principle I really like the idea of mayors, just wish they had more money to spend as I really think it would help sort out transport issues. At least our Conservative County Councillor is visible and active most of the time and not just at election season, although I don't agree with a budget cap for council tax and I'm a bit fed up of the local homes for local people bandwagon - outsiders are valuable too!

Take it back - I see there is a solitary Green female candidate!